Clearwater military news

Navy Seaman Apprentice Jordan P. Osmera, daughter of Stacie S. Van Nostrand of Clearwater and James G. Osmera Jr. of Omaha, Neb., was promoted to her current rank upon graduation from recruit training at Recruit Training Command, Great Lakes, Ill.

Osmera received the early promotion for outstanding performance during all phases of the training cycle.

Training included classroom study and practical instruction on naval customs, first aid, firefighting, water safety and survival, and shipboard and aircraft safety.

An emphasis was also placed on physical fitness.

The capstone event of boot camp is "Battle Stations," an exercise that gives recruits the skills and confidence they need to succeed in the fleet.

On May 12 and 13, the skies above MacDill Air Force Base will be busier than usual, with Navy F-18s, Air Force F-22s and A-10s and a host of civilian stunt pilots performing impressive feats of aerobatics.It’s all part of the semi-regular Tampa Bay C...

Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin’s chief of staff doctored an email and made false statements to create a pretext for taxpayers to cover expenses for the secretary’s wife on a 10-day trip to Europe last summer, the agency’s inspector general ...

President Donald Trump’s proposed military budget includes a nearly 11 percent spending increase for U.S. Special Operations Command headquartered at MacDill Air Force Base.The measure, if approved by Congress, would bump up the command’s budget by 1...

Orders from President Trump to plan a grand military parade showcasing the might of America’s armed forces has set off groans in some military quarters.The troops, it turns out, hate parades."There is not a soldier ever alive who loves a parade," sai...

AVON PARK From the cockpit of his A-10 Thunderbolt II fighter jet, a pilot speaks words known to warm the hearts of U.S. ground troops under fire."I’ve got 100 rounds 30 Mike Mike," says the pilot, seeking permission to let loose a short burst from t...

TAMPA — Former Marine David Shimkus calls it a "slap in the face to veterans" that the NFL rejected a bid to place an ad in the Super Bowl program asking fans to stand for the national anthem.So as a senior executive with Largo-based media company Re...

To people in the Tampa area, the old, gray four-engine KC-135 Stratotanker jets have been a familiar sight since the mid-1990s, when MacDill Air Force Base shifted from fighter training to aerial refueling.But the planes are new to the folks up at th...

TAMPA — Long-delayed plans for a new $148.6 million medical housing unit at the James A. Haley VA Medical Center have finally been approved by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.The 245,000-square-building will be designed to provide 96 medical surgica...

It took two eagle-eyed historians to track down the plane that led hundreds of Allied aircraft into Normandy during World War II.A few years ago, the historical treasure was languishing in an aircraft boneyard in Wisconsin.The plane, a twin-engine C-...

BERLIN — In the latest in a string of dangerous encounters between Russian and NATO military jets, a U.S. Navy plane came within five feet of a Russian Su-27 jet on Monday, according to the State Department. The incident occurred in international air...